This
technique also comes from Mr. A., who claims to have
seen it used in Las Vegas. After finishing hitting
his own hand, the dealer peeks at the top card. Various
ways of peeking are explained in the many websites
and videocassettes on cheating. If the top card is
an ace or 10, the dealer sloughs it off when picking
up the used cards. If the top card is a not an ace
or 10, the dealer does not discard it, but deals it
out in the normal manner.

Mr. A. says the
peek and burn was used against a high-stakes Online
Blackjack Games player who was playing alone at a
table. The effect is he got considerably less than
his fair share of good hands since many of the aces
and 10s he should have gotten instead ended up with
the discards. First base at a busy table would suffer
the same fate. The other players at a busy table would
be hurt to the extent that they would be playing with
a deck poor in aces and 10s, but they would not be
hurt as badly as the first player to receive cards.

You undoubtedly
have heard of dealing seconds, and you might be wondering
why a dealer who wants to cheat would bother with
the peek and burn because peeking and dealing seconds
gets the money faster. The answer is that dealing
undetectable seconds is a difficult skill to master.
Sloughing off a card is easier. So a dealer who wants
to cheat but who does not want to devote the time
to master seconds might attempt the peek and burn.

Several
western states have casinos devoted almost solely
to poker. California is the largest of these, with
the best variety and selection of games. Riverboats,
whether those rare ones that actually cruise or the
more common permanently docked variety, focus primarily
on the more lucrative casino-type games. Some have
cardrooms which don't even operate full-time, having
to yield space on high-attendance days to the other
games.